NASCAR rivalries these days are like mushrooms -- they spring up overnight and are gone almost before you know it.

One day drivers are jawing at each other on pit road and by the next race they both say they have moved on. Carl Edwards even went over to Brad Keselowski in Victory Lane at Nashville last week and congratulated him.

Jeff Gordon was asked on Friday why it is that there are no long-term feuds in NASCAR the way there used to be.

"I've asked this question many times," Gordon said. "I guess I've never had the opportunity to ask the right people. But I don't get the long-term rivalries and how guys won championships. Now maybe because you had a lot more engines blowing up and cars failing to finish the race or you just had such a bigger gap in competition that maybe you could get away with it. But if you build a rivalry with a guy and every week you're messing with him and he's messing with you, it's taking away your chance to win the race. If you start getting into a rivalry that's so heated that you're wrecking one another, you're probably not even going to be in the Chase, let alone have a shot at the championship because if you tick a guy off enough, he's going to make sure you don't win that championship. And that's why I don't understand when I go back through the history and watch all the things with Rusty (Wallace) and (Dale) Earnhardt and the Allisons and all these different rivalries, how did they win championships? And then you go to Richard (Petty) and his seven (championships), you don't hear about these rivalries with Richard getting in all these heated arguments and he's won more races and championships than anybody. So he seemed to keep the peace pretty good and I think that had a big part in him having cars at the end of the races to win those races and those championships. So, in my opinion, it's always been the case for me is if I get into a battle with a guy, I want to patch things up because I don't want it to linger because I don't want it to affect me at a time when it's crucial for us to win a race or battle for the championship. While it's great for the show, it's not great for you as a competitor."